ROANOKE TIMES 
                      Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times

DATE: Thursday, August 8, 1996               TAG: 9608080040
SECTION: BUSINESS                 PAGE: B-8  EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: JEFF STURGEON STAFF WRITER 


CHAMBER OFFICIAL RESIGNS LEAD CONSULTANT WILL HEAD CENTER

Director John Jennings is resigning from the Regional Chamber Small Business Development Center in Roanoke to work for Carilion Health System. He will be replaced Aug. 26 by his lead financial consultant, Douglas W. Murray Jr.

Jennings and Murray have received acclaim for their operation of the three-person center, an arm of the Roanoke Regional Chamber of Commerce, which provides free business, financial and management consulting and offers seminars and workshops.

In his new job, Jennings will be a strategy specialist at Carilion Health System, planning delivery of oncology and psychiatry services.

Jennings leaves at a time when the 6-year-old center is expanding the number of businesses it helps and when client businesses are making a greater economic impact, he said.

During the first six months of this year, the center helped 101 company owners and counseled them on investing $5 million. The companies hired 65 employees.

By comparison, last year, the center served 260 clients who invested $4.6 million and hired 55 people.

Murray, 30, holds a bachelor's degree from James Madison University and served as a management trainee with Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. in Danville overseeing aspects of tire production. He was a credit analyst at Dominion Bankshares Corp. and a credit and underwriting analyst at Dominion's successor, First Union National Bank of Virginia, before he joined the center two years ago.

In his new position, he also will serve as a chamber vice president.

Jennings, who joined the center in its inaugural year and directed it since 1992, called his tenure "one of the greatest learning experiences of my life."


LENGTH: Short :   43 lines
ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO:  (headshot) Murray. color.





















by CNB